Hamburg Film Festival: cinema for the people, and stars at your fingertips

Hamburg Film Festival genuinely is for ordinary folk. For ten days every autumn, around 140 German and international feature films and documentaries are screened in ten locations and seen by over 40,000 fans. All are world, European or German premieres, and most are introduced by the film makers themselves, Q&A included.

The programme, which ranges from cinematically challenging arthouse movies to success-bound mainstream cinema, is divided into ten permanent sections as well as others that change year by year. Stars such as Clint Eastwood, Jodie Foster, Christoph Waltz and Julian Schnabel, Dogme-founder Lars von Trier and German directors Wim Wenders, Fatih Akin, Andreas Dresen and Tom Tykwer show just how diverse a festival this is. The organisers also focus their attention on certain specific aspects. For example, the Three Colours Green section examines themes such as nuclear phase-out, renewable energies and the mobility of the future. Northern Lights presents feature films and documentaries from Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein. Eurovisuell concentrates on box-office hits from other European countries, and the Deluxe series shows classic films from a different country every year. Hamburg traditionally also reserves a starring role for young directors and their debut works. The film festival for children and young people, known as Michel, shows – in association with Frankfurt's LUCAS Children's Film Festival – German and international features and animations for the next generation of cinema-goers.